PREM NATH Vs. SUBHASH CHANDER AND OTHERS

JUDGEMENT

(1.) - Both the appeals are connected and with the consent of both parties, I propose to dispose of the case on merits. The suit had been filed at the instance of Subhash Chander and legal representatives of Satish being the sons of Takht Mal. He had two other sons of whom Prem Nath was the principal contesting defendant and who is the appellant in RSA No.830 of 2014. Yet another son Chaman Lal had also died and his legal representatives are also the defendants in suit. Maya Wanti, their mother was yet another defendant. Maya Wanti died during the pendency of the suit in the year 2003.

(2.) The suit was with reference to the estate of father Takht Mal in which the plaintiffs claimed an equal share as that of Prem Nath and Chaman Lal as legal representatives. The suit came to be instituted at a time when the defendant-Prem Nath was setting up a right to the property by virtue of an alleged compromise decree passed in the year 1996 under the terms of which Maya Wanti purported to admit a transfer of her right in the property to her son Prem Nath. The plaintiffs were seeking for declaration that the decree obtained was fraudulent, illegal and null and void and for claim to a joint ownership of the property with the defendant unbound by the terms of the decree. The mother came to Court to file a written statement denying that she had submitted herself to a decree transferring a right in the property and that it had been done without her knowledge. It was also her contention that the property belonged to her husband and she was interested that the property must devolve on all the sons and their representatives equally. Her statement was also recorded in the Court. Prem Nath took the defence that Maya Wanti was actually the owner of the whole property although the property had been purchased in the name of her husband and since she had transferred the right by virtue of compromise, the whole of the property had devolved only in his favour and none of the other defendants or the plaintiffs have any right in the property. The defendant also set up the Will said to have been executed by Maya Wanti during her life time. The Will, however, was not proved and the trial Court decreed the suit.

(3.) In the appeal filed by Prem Nath, the Appellate Court has modified the decree and has held that Maya Wanti was entitled to ⅕th share as heir to her husband along with the sons and of their legal representatives in equal shares and her own ⅕th share stood validly transferred by virtue of compromise in favour of Prem Nath. The appeals have been filed by the plaintiffs in RSA No.438 of 2014 and by the defendant Prem Nath in RSA No.830 of 2014.